His chuckle was low, the kind that made you wonder if you’d just stepped closer to danger or if danger had stepped closer to you. “So I know what to carve on your gravestone when Séraphine’s done with you.”
I just rolled my eyes.
He slipped ahead just enough to get in my way, his grin lopsided. “Well you can call me Rion. Easier for you to curse my name later.”
I almost told him my name. It was right there on the tip of my tongue—like an idiot offering up the first piece of herself to a man she barely knew. But what I did know? He was trouble. The kind of trouble my mother had warned me about since I was old enough to swim on my own—broad shoulders, easy grin, eyes that promised nothing good. Dangerous, probably. No…definitely.
“Sirena,” I said before I could stop myself.
Brilliant. Real smooth. The fake name wasn’t even that different—might as well have just told him my real one and saved myself the trouble of feeling like an idiot. I kept my chin high, even as I mentally smacked myself. Real creative. Change two letters and suddenly you’re a master of disguise.
“Sirena,” Rion repeated slowly, like he was trying the taste of it on his tongue. His mouth curved, but it wasn’t exactly a smile.
He tipped his head, a slow smirk curling his mouth. “Sirena. That’s cute. Even for a bad liar.”
I bristled, heat prickling up my neck. “Well, it’s the only one you’re getting,” I shot back.
His eyes glittering like he enjoyed the game more than he should.
Rion led me past the clocktower and deeper into the maze, the air thick with the scent of roasting chestnuts and the faint, sour reek of tanner’s vats.
Shadeau twisted on itself, a labyrinth of streets that seemed to rearrange with each turn, but Rion moved naturally, he knew every bend by heart. As we walked, I noticed how people seemed to move differently around Rion. A shopkeeper paused mid-sweep to nod respectfully. A fishmonger tipped his cap. Even the street urchins quieted as he passed.
“Sir,” they called him, polite and almost deferential—so different from last night when I’d walked this same path with Alaric. Then, the streets had been full of glares and muttered threats, like every shadow wanted to swallow us whole. With Rion, the shadows seemed to keep their distance. People watched him the way sailors watch an incoming tide—quietly, without question. Whatever his reputation was, he hadn’t earned it by accident.
And I wondered, briefly, how Alaric would react if he saw me walking beside a man who commanded that kind of presence. Probably with that infuriating scowl he wore whenever he thought I was getting too close to trouble—which, in his mind, was always.
For someone like Rion, who claimed to have answers, he wasn’t asking for anything in return. That alone set my nerves on edge. I’d learned the hard way that nothing in Shadeau came without a price—especially help.
So whywashehelping me?
The streets narrowed as we went, the buildings leaning in like conspirators. My sleeves brushed my wrists with every step—each touch a dull, pulsing reminder I tried to ignore.
Rion broke the silence without looking at me. “Pull up your sleeves.”
I stiffened. “No.”
He stopped so abruptly I nearly ran into him. When he turned, his focus fell—not to my face, but to my hands.
“Pull them up,” he said again. Not a request.
“I said no.” I folded my arms tighter, heat flaring in my chest.
His face smoothed—too carefully.
I took a step back.
He caught me by the elbow. His grip closed like iron as he tugged my sleeve up before I could twist away.
My breath left me in a silent rush.
Patches of skin had turned sickly gray-black, cracked and flaking. Beneath the peeling edges, flesh glistened wet and dark, mottled with rust-colored sores that looked less like wounds and more like decay taking hold.
Rion went still. “Fuck,” he muttered.
My other sleeve was yanked back before I could stop him. Both wrists burned now—throbbing, weeping, wrong.
“That’s Silver Salt,” he said. “And if we don’t get it off you, it will weaken you. Break you down piece by piece.”
